"My first trip to New York in 2000 is connected to a sensation of happiness. For one month, I was visiting a friend who used to live on Pelham Parkway in the Bronx. Even though we were friends, I was in New York hoping to take it further, because I liked her. We had several dinners together and we often traveled to Manhattan with the bus and the second or third day it reminded me of a film that I love; A Bronx Tale (1993) by Robert De Niro. I think De Niro was a bus driver in that film and he drives his bus on the route of Pelham Parkway. His son in the film fell in love with a black girl and his family did not approve of them dating together. There is this wonderful moment in the film where the son is mentored by this Italian-American mobster character who says teaches a life lesson. The lesson he tells regards how to discover if a woman loves you or not. He says something along the lines of picking up the women you like with your car you should first walk them to the car seat in front and next to you open the door for them and let them be seated. Then walk to the other side of the car and wait to see if she opens the door for you. If she does, then she is the one. If she doesn’t then she might be selfish. Anyway, nothing happened between us after our dates. We got back to the friend zone, but my trip to New York still felt like a dream. I’m originally from Rome and I had never been to such a cosmopolitan city I felt at home. So instead of falling in love with this girl, I fell in love with New York City."
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Photo and story by Feargal Agard
